Out of Time
by Joanna Hepler
Summary: After Rosslyn, Josh's loves find solace in each other's arms. SamJoshDonna.
1. Reveal

**Out of Time**

_- After Rosslyn, Josh's loves find solace in each other's arms. Sam/Josh/Donna._

This story is set during and immediately after Rosslyn, with the occasional later-season spoiler. While not my first work of fan-fiction, it is my first West Wing story and as such is bound to contain errors aplenty. The first couple of chapters extensively reprise In the Shadow of Two Gunmen; however, I have tried to fill in the gaps, so to speak. The real story comes after Rosslyn.

Warning: contains medium levels of slashy themes and low levels of slashy action.

**Chapter One: Reveal**

**MONDAY, 9:37 P.M.**

"Josh?"

Toby Ziegler swore over his breath, too concerned to care whether anyone heard. Chaos surrounded him, chaos for which he had always tried to prepare. Shouts, cries and screams whistled over Toby's head like Teflon, his ears alert to the sounds of one man.

"Charlie, have you seen Josh?"

His relationship with Josh was professional, workable - nothing more. They had little in common, even less of shared interest, yet Toby was scouring the area searching for him. _What are you talking about? Of course I'm looking for him, _Toby told himself sternly. _You think I'd suddenly cease to be a human being in times like this?_

"Yeah, he got in the car with Leo."

Toby shook his head; was no one looking? "No he didn't. Shanahan got in the car with Leo. Josh didn't get in the car." Charlie nodded in apology, but Toby had already strode away. The Communications Director was subconsciously counting the minutes since the shooting, hoping against hope that nothing serious had happened to Josh. Yet half-forgotten chapters of a first-aid manual were tapping at his brain, telling him time was of the essence and if Josh was seriously injured then Toby needed to find him, fast.

Finally he spotted him: an arm, clothed in grey, poking out the edge of a planter-box. Toby ran as quickly as his suit and middle-aged body would allow across the concrete and up the stairs, still hoping.

"Josh? Josh, didn't you hear me shouting for you? I didn't know where the hell you -"

Toby stopped. It was Josh, for sure - sitting against the planter-box with a large, bloody bullet hole in his chest.

"I need a doctor... I need help!"

Toby shouted across the concrete common, his eyes fixated on the bloody leak in Josh's chest as if someone had painted it there. It was so foreign, such a jolt to the senses, so ultimately distracting, that Toby barely heard the footsteps surrounding him as Josh slid to the ground and into Toby's shaking arms.

"J-Josh?" gasped CJ. Toby didn't see her; he was looking out for the paramedics that were surely coming over. Turning his head, he saw Sam kneel next to him, gaze open-mouthed for a second at Josh's limp body, then shout urgently for a doctor.

_This cannot be happening_, Toby silently muttered, as if a news ticker were playing in his head. _This isn't happening. This isn't happening._

"Step away, please!"

Toby felt himself being roughly pulled away by a pair of strong hands; seconds later Josh was surrounded by a swarm of paramedics. They spoke in hushed but rather carrying whispers in some sort of medico-dialect Toby couldn't understand; phrases like "BP is 90 palp" jumped out at him. One medic shouted in English, "Ambulance, NOW!" but Toby was too far out of it to register. CJ, evidently calling on every ounce of self-restraint she possessed, was dabbing at her eyes with a handkerchief and mumbling a hushed prayer to herself. Sam had given up trying to get a straight answer out of the paramedics and instead kneeled silently at Josh's head, his face as strained and twitchy as Josh's body.

After what was barely a minute, but seemed like hours to Toby, one paramedic appeared to pull a stretcher out of his pocket. Bound by shock to the concrete, Toby watched as Josh was hauled onto the stretcher, tubes, blood and gauze obscuring his face and chest.

"Where are you going? What are you doing?" Sam asked the paramedics urgently, but the only coherent response he got was "Not now. No time." The medico-swarm surrounded Josh's trolley as it sailed down the stairs, past the distracted crowd and into the waiting ambulance. Toby, Sam and CJ watched the ambulance hurtle along the road, sirens further fragmenting the already shattered peace.

**MONDAY, 9:42 P.M.**

"You three all right back there?"

"Yeah, we're fine, just-just get us the hell to GW!"

Barely had the front doors closed than the police car gave an almighty lurch and bolted. CJ, Toby and Sam were squashed into the back seat - Sam, who was holding CJ's hand very tightly, had more or less ended up in Toby's lap, but neither had said a word. All three had felt the car accelerate without them and were thrown against the back seat.

"Sorry 'bout that," called the driver.

"It's fine, we don't care," replied Toby's muffled voice. Sam tried to squirm his way out of his boss's lap, but realised soon after there was nowhere else to sit. If he hadn't known better, Sam would have sworn Toby was trying to keep a grip on him. The driver talked to the police radio and the second cop in the passenger's seat, but the back seat remained silent save for CJ's occasional sniffs.

Toby twisted around to get a better view out the window. The Potomac was beautiful to look at this time of year, the city lights reflected in the water's glass-like gaze. Toby smiled ruefully at himself, appreciating the river's beauty in spite of earthly events.

"Sirs? Ma'am?"

Toby snapped out of his momentary reverie. Sam and CJ were also alert.

"A coupla guys are sayin' on the radio that the President himself was shot-"

"WHAT?!" shouted Sam and CJ simultaneously. Toby was suddenly thankful neither of them were driving the car.

"-but it's only in his side, and that it's not that serious," finished the cop in the passenger's seat. "Thought you guys might need to know that, is all."

"You thought we might-?!" CJ began to splutter, but Sam gripped her hand even more tightly.

"Were there any more details?" Sam asked urgently.

"No, sir. They don't want the story to blow itself out of proportion on the grapevine."

"Out of-? Sir, I'm the White House Press Secretary! The President's just been shot, for crying out loud! If this story isn't already all over CNN, I'll-I'll..." CJ hollered, before trailing off in a profusion of splutters.

"Eat your hat?" suggested Toby.

"Eat _you_, more like," retorted CJ.

"Well, that would come under the definition of cannibalism, which I'm quite certain is ille-"

"Guys! GW round the corner!" shouted the passenger cop. Toby fell silent at once, the thoughts of all three focusing immediately on Josh. The cop slammed on the brakes at the emergency entrance to GW, decelerating the car without its passengers.

"Sorry, guys!"

"Doesn't matter, the ambulance is here!" called CJ, almost falling out of the car. The three ran to the entrance, only to be greeted with a heap of tubes, gauze and braces on a stretcher.

"Gunshot wound, no exit!"

_Josh!_

"He's got decreased breath sounds on the left. Pulse ox 92 on 15 litres."

"It's Josh!" called CJ.

"I've got the HaemoCue."

"Josh!" called Leo, rushing to the trolley. "What happened?!"

"I don't know, he was behind us," replied Toby as the mob steered the crash cart through the hallways of George Washington Hospital.

"Gunshot wound, entry, left fifth intercostal space."

"Josh, I'm here!" yelled Sam, in danger of being left behind by the pack. _Someone help him! Whoever's up there, I implore you!_

"This meeting, I shouldn't be at this meeting..." murmured Josh, in a semi-conscious haze as the trolley sailed by.

"Trauma 1's ready."

"Get a needle. Chest tube tray."

"Senator..." blurted Josh.

"Tell me what's happening!" shouted Leo, desperately.

"I don't have time!" shouted a doctor in reply.

"I shouldn't be at this meeting..." Josh repeated, consciousness seeping out of him.

"Pulse ox 88."

"I need to get to New Hampshire!" Josh declared, trying to sit up with every ounce of effort he had.

"You went to New Hampshire. We both did," said Sam, who had appeared seemingly out of nowhere at Josh's side. "You came and got me."

Sam's words seemed to comfort himself more than Josh, who was quickly fading into oblivion.

"On my count. One! Two! Three!"

A dozen pairs of strong hands transferred Josh from the crash cart to the hospital bed.

"Josh, a bullet collapsed your lung. I'm putting in a tube to re-expand it..."

Medical jargon surrounded him; his mind was spinning into the past...

"Sirs? Ma'am?"

CJ looked up from where Josh lay, startled. A kindly-looking man dressed in hospital greens smiled at her.

"Ma'am, we need you to come with us. You too, sirs," he added, speaking to Toby and Sam. The former made to follow CJ out of the room, while the latter appeared to ignore them completely.

"Sir?"

"Sam?"

He stood at the head of the stretcher, forlorn and lachrymose, shoved aside by countless doctors. He muttered comforting niceties under his breath, verbally holding Josh's hand while holding himself in like a shaken beer can. Toby was strongly reminded of the homeless men he'd once met in a mouldy corner of D.C.: disconsolate, yet refusing to appear so.

"Sam?" called Toby. Sam's head jerked upwards like a marionette, the rest of him frozen where he stood.

"Yeah?" he replied, a hint of wobble in his voice.

"The doctor here," Toby motioned to the smiling man next to him, "says he needs the three of us to follow him someplace."

Sam nodded automatically, then bent over to whisper a final something. CJ followed the green-clad doctor out of the room, while Toby waited for Sam to join them.

"You okay, Sam?" Toby asked, with uncharacteristic concern.

Sam turned to look at Toby. "Yeah. Don't worry about me." He tried to smile and found he couldn't, choosing instead to twist his mouth and admire the hospital linoleum. Toby watched him closely as they walked behind CJ, through busy corridors and into a private waiting room.

"You guys want some coffee?" CJ asked, turning around.

Toby replied, "Yes, thanks," but Sam just nodded again, as if his conscious self had gone to sleep and put his body on autopilot. Toby gave CJ one of those meaningful looks and steered Sam into the nearest chair.

Sam felt his body being asked to sit down; he obliged, but with no earthly idea why. All that mattered to him was Josh - his best friend, his soulmate - and whether he'd live to write another memo.


	2. Sam and Donna Got A Raw Deal

**Chapter Two: Sam and Donna Got a Raw Deal**

**MONDAY, 10:07 P.M.**

"Donna?"

The familiar echoes of Josh's voice reverberated around the bullpen. Donna glanced up, wondering what had happened to his vocal cords - why was his voice so high-pitched and feminine all of a sudden? She put it down to stress and possibly an ill-fitting pair of Y-fronts.

"Donna, are you there?"

Her interest piqued, Donna got up and looked around - that was definitely not Josh's voice. _Of course not, _she remembered. _He's at the forum thing in Rosslyn. Why would you think he'd be in two places at once? Come to think of it,_ Donna mused, glancing at the clock subtitled "POTUS", _where are they? I mean, the President likes rope lines, but not this much..._

"Donna?"

"Margaret!" Donna shouted, having forgotten entirely why she was looking around. "Was that you shouting? I thought - I mean, it didn't sound like Josh, maybe - what? Margaret? What happened?" she asked desperately, as Margaret's face was illuminated by a sole fluorescent light.

"The President, he -" Margaret's throat appeared to convulse; no sound came out. She motioned frantically to the television and rummaged around for a remote. Donna found one in the drawer and turned up the volume.

"...getting reports that President Bartlet has been shot outside a forum at the Newseum in Rosslyn, Virginia. Details remain sketchy, but it has been confirmed that approximately thirty minutes ago, several shots were fired from the ninth floor of a nearby office building. Secret Service agents were..."

Donna clapped a hand to her mouth, her brain reeling. "My God...Oh, my God!"

Margaret grabbed Donna's other hand and made to drag her to the door. "Donna? Mrs. Landingham and I are heading over. If you'd like to come..."

Donna was furiously trying to prevent herself from thinking the worst. _Who else was there? Leo was there, Toby and Sam, CJ, Josh..._ She took a deep breath, attempting to steel herself. No matter what had happened, she was no use to anyone as a blubbering mess.

"Yeah. I'll come." Donna grabbed her coat, purse and some half-eaten Chinese takeaway of unknown age before following Margaret out the door. Behind her, the television continued to blare.

"...President is reported to have been shot in the abdomen, while agencies are reporting - and we stress this is unconfirmed - that at least one senior White House staffer has been rushed to George Washington University Hospital in a critical condition..."

**MONDAY, 10:38 P.M.**

"...why, though Sam tried to talk to them..."

Sam raised his head, wondering who was talking about him. To his mild bewilderment, he found himself sitting in a waiting-room chair next to CJ and across from Toby. The Communications Director and two men Sam didn't recognise were conducting a hushed conversation over several notepads and a stack of official-looking forms. Sam could only presume Toby had led him to the chair and forced him to sit down. He vaguely remembered wandering around and accidentally walking into the head nurse on duty, but the coffee cup in his hand yielded no clues as to its origins.

The First Lady had apparently just walked into the waiting room with the news they'd been desperately wanting to hear: "the president's gonna be fine." Unfortunately for Sam, he'd missed everything Mrs. Bartlet had said about Josh. Sam mentally kicked himself as he realised what he'd missed; he would have physically kicked himself as well were it not for his crowded surroundings.

"Did they say anything, Toby?"

"Not, to my knowledge, anything useful; Sam stopped talking to them after a while and kind of knelt at Josh's head..."

Sam gave up trying to follow Toby's increasingly whispered conversation. He was too drained to recognise the beginnings of a headache; in any case, they were more or less drowned out by the nauseous boulder that had settled in the bottom of his stomach.

He visualised himself coming home from work at some absurd hour and pressing the relevant button on his answering machine. After a couple of unimportant messages came Josh's voice out of the speaker. It was a minor request, something Sam could deal with easily. Yet he kept the message anyway.

_I _am_ gonna hear Josh's voice again,_ Sam told himself. _He'll come out of this. Just you watch._

But nothing Sam told himself could rid his stomach of the growing nausea that suggested otherwise. He looked around, searching for a distraction. Yet none came.

Sam thought back, almost involuntarily, to those moments he'd passed Josh in the hallways. The half-smiles, the Josh-smiles, those spontaneous facial twitches that meant, "Keep going, Sam. You're doing a good job. We appreciate you." As he thought, some of the tenseness he didn't even know he had left him, only to be immediately replaced with smudges of melancholy and panic.

_How could this happen to us?_ Sam asked of a god in whom he'd long ago ceased to believe. _What did Josh do? What did I do? Josh Lyman is a good man. He's a trusting, loyal, well-meaning, decent guy. You're not supposed to kill off those sorts of people. You're supposed to inflict cancer and liver disease and boils and whatever else on society's weeds. Murderers. Rapists. Terrible people. Not Josh_.

Sam slumped in his chair, burying his face in his hands. _You don't think he's suffered enough?!_ he yelled inaudibly, glaring at the ceiling through tearful eyes. _His sister died in a house fire. His father died of cancer. His grandfather was an inmate at Birkenau. But you're supposed to know all that, aren't you?! Why the hell are you making him suffer again? What did he ever do to displease you? I'm sure you've heard this all before, but you're a spiteful, hateful man, God. You really are. Don't expect to see me at a church or synagogue anytime soon._

The door opened in the background, dragging Sam back to reality. He looked up at the unfamiliar visitor, failing to deaden a movement of the boulder in his stomach.

_Please, whoever's up there, let it be good news_, Sam begged. _I don't think I could take much more of this._

Said the visitor, "We can't make you very comfortable here, and the procedure's likely to take 12 to 14 hours. So-"

The door at the other end opened to reveal Donna, her usually bright face drawn and wary.

"I'm sorry. They told me I should come back here. I'm sorry."

Everyone paused before Donna asked, "Is there word on the president?"

CJ replied, with less than her usual gusto, "The president's gonna be fine."

Donna let out a great breath of air, daring to smile. "Oh my God... that's the best news I've ever heard." She appeared not to notice everyone else's morose expression.

When no one moved to speak, Donna continued, "I had a hard time getting in. I had to find an agent who knew me, I was shaking..." She smiled half-hartedly, as if she realised her inability to hold in her babble.

"Donna?" cut in Toby, his numb expression alarming her into silence.

"Yeah?"

"Josh was hit," he pronounced.

Everyone in the room, including CJ and Sam, turned to Donna to assess her reaction - or lack thereof. Donna didn't appear to have registered this news at all, shaking her head and replying, "Hit with what?"

Toby paused before summoning his inner strength and clarifying, "He was shot. In the chest." CJ added, "He's in surgery right now."

Sam watched Donna closely as her expression changed from bewilderment to realisation to horror in a matter of seconds. "I don't understand, is... is it serious?"

Toby replied emotionlessly, "Yes, it's critical. The bullet punctured his lung and damaged a major artery."

Donna's eyes bulged as she put a hand over her mouth, clearly suppressing tears. The visitor looked around, clearly discomfited, before continuing in the same vein as before. "Well, I was just saying that we can't..."

Sam stopped listening, choosing instead to pick at his thoughts. He perked up only long enough to register CJ and Charlie's departures. Sam, Donna and Toby were left in the waiting room, each awaiting the fate of one of their own.

**MONDAY, 11:48 P.M.**

Sam stared at the ceiling, absently noting its displeasingly drab colour. There was nothing else to look at; CJ was on the phone, Toby seemed to be writing a never-ending memo and everyone else was reading magazines. In any case, Sam had never considered himself a _Vanity Fair_ kind of guy. Particularly when one considered its writing staff...

_I hate this. I can't believe that out of all the people I work with, out of all the people I know, Josh got the bullet in his chest. If it were anyone else getting shot, I'd be sitting next to Josh in this waiting room. We'd be holding hands and whispering stupid things to each other, to take our minds off... whatever. Instead, I'm sitting next to Toby and Donna_.

Sam glanced at the empty chairs on either side of him, as if noticing for the first time that Toby and Donna were no longer sitting in them. _Don't get me wrong. I like Toby. I mean, I don't have a lot of choice there since he's my boss, but... He's like some hermit older brother of mine who moved out when I was ten and only ever sent me and my parents Christmas and birthday cards. Donna... I don't know about Donna. She's the sweet girl who lives down the street and talks to me on the way to school. She's the sort of girl I'd ask to my prom, except she'd never go with me because she's way too pretty. She'd probably say that no one ever asked her because everyone else in her grade was prettier than her, which is completely not true, but -_

_Wait a minute!_ he exclaimed soundlessly. _How did that happen? I was thinking about Josh and how much I-I love him and miss him and hope to God he makes it through and-and suddenly I'm daydreaming about taking Donna to my prom? What the hell?_

"The ceiling's a rather boring colour, isn't it?"

At the other end of the room, Donna raised her head groggily. She'd been pretending to absorb herself in a trash magazine with which Sam wasn't familiar. A top-heavy C-grade celebrity shouted at Sam from the front page, giving him the fleeting impression of a horde of Pamela Andersons rushing towards him.

"Wha?"

Sam stood up, not realising Donna was still in the room. "I'm sorry, Donna. I didn't realise you were there."

"Nah. Don't mention it. I rediscovered the reason why I only ever read these things in doctor's surgeries and blood banks." Donna rubbed her eyes before half-smiling at Sam and asking, "What do you need?"

"I- don't worry. It's nothing. Just me talking about the ceiling and what a boring colour it is. Not that I was expecting the Sistine Chapel or anything..."

"Sam..." pleaded Donna in her distinctive twang, turning his name into a multi-syllable word. "Sam, talk to me. What's on your mind?"

Sam got up and sat down next to Donna in the corner of the room. "I don't know. I don't really wanna talk much, if that's okay with you. I'd just like to sit and, you know, maybe have some coffee."

Donna replied, "Yeah. Coffee'd be good. I'll grab some. How do you like yours?"

"Uh... I don't know. I can't tell the difference between coffees anymore. It's all the same brown, bitter liquid to me."

Donna half-smiled again and left, leaving Sam alone with his thoughts and the shouting magazine.

_What am I doing?!_ cried Sam's brain. _My bester-than-best friend's life is in mortal danger - I realise 'bester-than-best' isn't a word, but what the hell - and here I am dreaming about Donna and love and..._

Unable to take it any further, Sam let out a helpless, primaeval scream. It was a shout of frustration, of a man unable to comprehend his own thoughts and with no one left to share them.

"Sam, are you all right?"

Donna re-entered the room with two plastic cups of coffee. Glancing at the three empty cups next to Sam's recently vacated seat, she passed one to him and kept the other for herself. Sam didn't look up, instead prising the lid off his coffee and staring at his reflection in the dark, murky liquid within.

"I don't wanna talk. About anything. Let's just sit here and... enjoy the ceiling," he said, watching his reflected nose wobble in the cup.

Donna was a little taken aback, but readily agreed. "Sure. No problem."

While she didn't dare let slip her thoughts, the cogs in Donna's head were busily churning away, trying to find a solution to a problem she had no hope of solving - helping Josh and Sam out of the respective holes they'd fallen into. She mightn't have been in the holes herself, and mightn't necessarily know the way out, but Donna was determined to find a solution.

"Nobody drags down Josh Lyman and Sam Seaborn like this," she told herself, glancing at Sam's miserable figure in the seat next to hers.

"Nobody.


End file.
